Study Desk

God is fair, and he will remember all the work you have done. He will remember that you showed your love to him by helping his people and that you continue to help them.

God made a promise to Abraham. And there is no one greater than God, so he made the promise with an oath in his own name—an oath that he would do what he promised.

God wanted to prove that his promise was true. He wanted to prove this to those who would get what he promised. He wanted them to understand clearly that his purposes never change. So God said something would happen, and he proved what he said by adding an oath.

No one knows who his father or mother was or where he came from. And no one knows when he was born or when he died. Melchizedek is like the Son of God in that he will always be a priest.

Levi was not yet born, but he already existed in his ancestor Abraham when Melchizedek met him.

But Christ became a priest with God's oath. God said to him, "The Lord has made a promise with an oath and will not change his mind: ‘You are a priest forever.'"

So this means that Jesus is the guarantee of a better agreement from God to his people.

The law chooses high priests who are men and have the same weaknesses that all people have. But after the law, God spoke the oath that made his Son high priest. And that Son, made perfect through suffering, will serve forever.

But the work that has been given to Jesus is much greater than the work that was given to those priests. In the same way, the new agreement that Jesus brought from God to his people is much greater than the old one. And the new agreement is based on better promises.

These gifts and sacrifices are only about food and drink and special washings. They are only rules about the body. God gave them for his people to follow until the time of his new way.

Christ entered the Most Holy Place only one time—enough for all time. He entered the Most Holy Place by using his own blood, not the blood of goats or young bulls. He entered there and made us free from sin forever.

So surely the blood sacrifice of Christ can do much more. Christ offered himself through the eternal Spirit as a perfect sacrifice to God. His blood will make us completely clean from the evil we have done. It will give us clear consciences so that we can worship the living God.

So Christ brings a new agreement from God to his people. He brings this agreement so that those who are chosen by God can have the blessings God promised, blessings that last forever. This can happen only because Christ died to free people from sins committed against the commands of the first agreement.

That is why blood was needed to begin the first agreement between God and his people.

The high priest enters the Most Holy Place once every year. He takes with him blood to offer. But he does not offer his own blood like Christ did. Christ went into heaven, but not to offer himself many times like the high priest offers blood again and again.

Then he said, "Here I am, God. I have come to do what you want." So God ends that first system of sacrifices and starts his new way.

And now Christ waits there for his enemies to be put under his power.

With one sacrifice Christ made his people perfect forever. They are the ones who are being made holy.

We know that God said, "I will punish people for the wrongs they do; I will repay them." And he also said, "The Lord will judge his people."

Faith helps us understand that God created the whole world by his command. This means that the things we see were made by something that cannot be seen.